Partitioning strategies (was Re: [TriLUG] partitioning: primary orlogical)

al johson alfjon at mindspring.com
Thu May 16 03:08:31 EDT 2002


Well I prefer at least two partitions, because of the threat of viruses
(yes, I know they're rare in Linux--but just give that some time to
develop). If you have two partitions you can put the operating system on one
partition and use the second partition to put your valuable data on. Then if
your operating system gets a virus, at least you might be able to save your
data. Also most disk failures usually don't take down the entire drive, just
a few sectors which have had the most wear and tear.

 "I have two disks in my Debian box,", if you mean you use two separate hard
drives, that is even better than partitions to protect data because you can
have your Debian system on one disk and your data on another. So in that
case, yes, I'd prefer just one partition "on each hard drive". But this
experience comes from the world of DOS and Windows, not Linux which is both
virus-resistant and not as subject as those two to hard drive destructions.
But, I can say I definitely have destroyed several hard drives from overuse,
a couple not too long ago either. The older ones you used to be able to fix
by low-level formatting them, unfortunately today that can't be done. But
harddrives still go bad from time to time, and usually at the worst
times.--Al  Johnson.
-----------------------------------
----- Original Message -----
From: Ben Pitzer <uncleben at mindspring.com>
To: <trilug at trilug.org>
Sent: Wednesday, May 15, 2002 10:44 PM
Subject: Partitioning strategies (was Re: [TriLUG] partitioning: primary
orlogical)


> Okay, I'll open this up to the general public.  I have two disks in my
> Debian box, and to be perfectly honest, unless you are mounting multiple
> disks, I find it very wasteful to overpartition a hard drive.  Creating
> partitions like this was a way to use multiple disks within a system,
> each for a filesystem.  For the average user, I find that a single /
> partition, or perhaps a /boot and a / in the case of RH or Mandrake
> users, is usually sufficient.  I came to this conclusion in painful
> ways.  First, if all the partitions are on one disk, it doesn't make a
> difference in terms of disk error recovery.  If the disk has a bad
> sector, that's one thing, but how often these days does that happen?
> Typically, the entire disk fails, in which case having multiple
> partitions won't make that much of a difference.  Am I wrong about
> this?  I don't have much experience with data recovery (and how much
> would that cost the average user anyway?  Is it worth it to get your old
> email from Gramma?)
>
> Additionally, I found that I was misappropriating my paritions.  Too
> often, I would overuse one partition quickly, and run out of space
> there, yet only be using tiny portions of my other partitions.  Thus,
> while the disk would only be 30-40% used, I would be at 98% on one
> partition.  Granted, that's the fault of the partitioner, however it's
> just easier, less complicated, and less likely to cause problems if I
> just have fewer partitions.
>
> Any thoughts on this?  I really think that there is very little wrong
> with creating just a / and swap, or a /boot, root and swap partition in
> the majority of cases.
>
> Regards,
> Ben Pitzer
>
>
>
> On Wed, 2002-05-15 at 17:54, Stephen R. Morris wrote:
> >
> >
> > I'd like to create the following partitions:
> >
> > /boot
> > /
> > swap
> > /tmp
> > /usr
> > /var
> > /home
> > /opt
> > /win   [i.e. accessible from Linux and Win98]
> >
> > (NOTE: The disk drive is new and is dedicated to Linux; it's the IDE
> > slave.)
> >
> > The question is: Does it matter which partitions are physical (primary)
> > and which are logical (part of the extended partition)?
> >
> > Thank you.
> > Steve Morris
> > _______________________________________________
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> > TriLUG Organizational FAQ:
> >     http://www.trilug.org/~lovelace/faq/TriLUG-faq.html
>
>
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